Item: Jaguar XF
Rating: 4.5
Author: Nic Cackett

3 December 2015

By 2007, Jaguar was stuck in the doldrums. Ford’s ownership, and membership of the Premier Automotive Group, had not come without its advantages, but the introduction of the S-Type in 1999 and the X-Type two years later had not set the world alight.

The X-Type, manacled to the same front-drive platform as the Ford Mondeo, was no match for the dynamism and verve of its compact German rivals, and the S-Type – in looks, certainly – harked back too plainly to an era that the rest of the country was fast forgetting.

Jaguar struggles for name recognition in some markets, hence why the cat comes with an indentity badge
Nic Cackett
Road tester

Dramatic change was required, not only to revitalise Jaguar’s line-up and promote much-needed sales but also to point the firm in a new direction that would establish it as a forward-thinking entity rather than one overly obsessed with its heyday.

So the XF, a car distinct from anything Jaguar had built before, was meant as a statement. Presciently introduced just as Ford sold the company to current owner Tata, the XF’s impact was seismic, not only for its determined focus on the future but also for the beguiling way it drove.

Everything that followed has slotted into the groove forged by the XF. Now it, too, is due for renewal. Its success would seem to make that prospect daunting but, in truth, there is much about the old model that Jaguar will have been happy to fix, such as the comparatively heavy, Ford-derived steel architecture.

The latest model is predominantly aluminium. It’s lighter and leaner, yet bigger inside, too – another overhaul prescribed by its predecessor’s shortcomings. It also gets a range of new engines, with four variants of JLR's new 2.0-litre, four-cylinder Ingenium diesel engines, which was further supplemented by a trio of Ingenium petrols for 2017, while the top of the range is dominated by 3.0-litre V6 petrol and diesel engines mainly found in the XF S.

Following the successful launch of the Jaguar XE, Jaguar is keen to prove to buyers – especially those purchasing through work – that there’s something for everyone in the line-up, none more so than its recent additions to the engine line-up but also with the announcement that the second-generation Sportbrake is joining the XF ranks.

For this Autocar road test we’re testing the 2.0-litre 180PS R-Sport auto to find out if the XF is still worth getting excited about.

Verdict

Model tested:

Rating: 9

Jaguar XF

Good

Poised yet pillowy ride

Handling

Increased size incorporated into its style

Bad

Cold engine noise

Interior a little too strait-laced

Not as quick as claimed

DESIGN & STYLING

If the previous XF was about dramatic insurrection into German territory, the new one is a more methodical expansion of its hard-won place in buyers’ minds.

Consequently, its slightly different proportions notwithstanding, the model doesn’t look drastically different from before, despite Jaguar’s insistence that the design was born of a clean sheet. This, of course, is nonsense. Being instantly recognisable as a Jaguar was rule number one, necessitating that it adhere to the same raked shape that had gone before.

Further reductions in the XF’s drag comes from using apertures in the front bumper to channel air over the front wheels
Matt Prior
Editor-at-large

Fitting this familiar profile onto the new platform was the more pressing task, the smaller Jaguar XE’s size having helped to dictate the dimensions that its modular aluminum-intensive architecture must now adopt.

The move to a cutting-edge amalgamation of exotic alloys, self-piercing rivets and structural adhesives is the latest model’s defining feature. Its chief benefits – as much as 190kg shed from the kerb weight, a 28 percent increase in rigidity and 51mm gained in the wheelbase – directly affect much that we are about to discuss.

Aesthetically, though, they are cleverly hidden in the car’s elongated rear deck and dramatically shortened front overhang, resulting in a car that is 7mm shorter than before.

The body delivers near 50/50 weight distribution, with the chassis again based on front double wishbones and Jaguar’s own integral link rear suspension. Gaydon has persisted with this rear set-up’s weight penalty over a conventional multi-link in return for the freedom it offers its engineers in independently tuning for lateral and longitudinal loads.

More recent innovation comes in the form of new passive dampers, which feature an extra valve in the piston that remains open (and more supple) at urban speeds, and then closes as the pace increases to make the ride progressively firmer.

The car is built on Jaguar’s lightweight aluminium intensive architecture and has been given different chassis set-up from the saloon. Despite the different settings the model retains the sporty setup of its sibling.

The XF Sportbrake has air springs at the rear in place of the saloon’s standard steel coils to enhance its load-lugging capability. The air springs have been designed to keep the body composed even when carrying loads and are claimed to be most effective when combined with optional adaptive dampers. As for its boot space there is 565 litres to play with, with the rear seats up and 1700 litres with them down. That beats the XF saloon by 25 litres and 815 litres respectively and puts it very close to the carrying capabilities of the BMW 5 Series Touring.

The XF is exclusively rear-wheel drive, although it can be had with Intelligent All Wheel Drive, a system that sends power to the rear wheels a majority of the time until extra traction is required. Powering the XF is predominantly the work of the new 2.0-litre, all-aluminium Ingenium diesel engine in 161bhp, 178bhp and 235bhp guises.

The four-cylinder unit features common-rail injection, variable-geometry turbochargers and variable valve timing – not to mention the selective catalytic reduction technology that ensures EU6 compliance. The diesel range is completed with a 296bhp 3.0-litre V6.

The Ingenium petrol range is new for 2017, with the four-cylinder Ingenium 2.0-litre units making use of continuously variable valve lift technology to boost performance and efficiency. The trios output are 197bhp, 247bhp and 296bhp respectively, while topping the range is a 3.0-litre V6 found in the XF S pumping out 375bhp.

Jaguar’s go-to gearbox, the eight-speed ZF automatic, remains an option across the board (and standard on the 296bhp diesel and 377bhp petrol V6s), but a six-speed manual – also co-developed with ZF – is the default transmission, and it is this version that delivers 71.7mpg and 104g/km efficiency when twinned with the lower-powered Ingenium.

INTERIOR

If you were looking for evidence that the new XF is intended as a cagey evolution of the old, its cabin provides it.

Like the Jaguar XE, this is now a Jaguar suited and booted primarily for business. The firm’s natural proclivity for flair, one feels, has this time been kept mercilessly in check and the bottom line ruthlessly adhered to in all corners.

Jaguar has removed the lining for the boot ceiling on the XF, like with the XE, but it looks cheap to me
Matt Saunders
Road test editor

This hasn’t inhibited a drastic improvement in fit and finish, but the plastics aren’t uniformly impressive. The end result is not in the same league as a high-spec Audi A6 – which mingles luxury and premium finishes about as well as it’s possible to do – but it still manages to evince an upmarket and purposeful sense of style.

Several items – the peekaboo vents, the gear selector dial, the phosphor blue ambient lighting – are firmly established XF traits. Others – the air-con switchgear and the infotainment – are recognisable carryovers from the XE. The cabin’s size, though, is clearly all new and appreciably better than before.

The previous XF traded a little too keenly on the concept of a snug, sporting saloon, the rear ultimately feeling more cramped the longer you spent in it.

The new model, with its roofline and wheelbase tweaked in the right directions, conveys a more liberal sense of space, certainly in comparison with the XE. This stops short of outright capaciousness – as it must, the XJ being Jaguar’s back-seat pantheon – but with 24mm more room for knees and 15mm more for legs, adults ought to feel markedly less shortchanged if they’re consigned to the rear.

Only those equipped with unsportingly long thigh bones might still feel their knees are unreasonably close to the seat in front, and that could be said of almost every contender in the class.

Anyone given to grumbling about boot space will need to be even more scrupulous, because there looks to be a lot of it, added in no small measure by the potential to fold the rear seats flat, thus creating more than two metres of shallow load length. The new XF Sportbrake increases the space available to owners, with the estate capable of carrying 25 litres more than the saloon and almost as much as its closest rival - the BMW 5 Series Touring.

The first XF made great play of its infotainment set-up, the centre-stack touchscreen being an integral part of Jaguar’s brave new world. Unfortunately, like a shopping trolley in a canal, the system remained still while the technology swiftly improved around it, meaning it had become distinctly clunky well before the model was finally retired.

Its replacement, also used in other Jaguar Land Rover models, comes in two formats: the 8.0in InControl Touch (as tested) and the 10.2in InControl Touch Pro, which removes physical shortcut buttons entirely and comes equipped with a quad-core processor. The Touch Pro system also equips the XF with a virtual instrument cluster, similar to those made prevalent on the latest Audis, Volkswagens Mercedes-Benzes and BMWs.

Even the more basic set-up is a marked improvement on its predecessor, with a more intuitive menu system and a drastically enhanced appearance. Although insufficient to earn it class-leading status (BMW and Audi produce much slicker infotainment software), the XF at least now seems to be keeping pace with its rivals rather than getting left behind.

There are four trim levels to choose from for the Jaguar XF - Prestige, Portfolio, R-Sport and S, split in two categories - Luxury and Sport. The entry-level Luxury models, also known as Presitge, get 17in alloy wheels, bi-xenon headlights, a leather upholstery, electrically adjustable and heated front seats, rear parking sensors and Jaguar's InControl Touch infotainment system complete with Jaguar's standard 80W audio system.

Upgrade to Portfolio and your XF gets more luxuries such as 18in alloy wheels, Windsor-clad leather upholstery, more electrical front seat adjustment, gloss veneer, split foling rear seats, a heated windscreen, keyless entry, front parking sensors and a reversing camera, as well as a 380W Meridian sound system. Opt for the R-Sport trim and the XF gains a sporty bodykit, sports suspension, black headlining, front parking sensors and lots of exterior gloss black trim on top of the Prestige trim, while the range topping S models get 19in alloy wheels, a more aggressive bodykit, red brake calipers, keyless entry, a 380W Meridian sound system, a reversing camera and adaptive dampers added to the package.

Those opting for the Sportbrake will also gain some roof rails, a rear spoiler, rear self levelling air suspension, a powered tailgate and a 40:20:40 split folding rear seats.

ENGINES & PERFORMANCE

2.0-litre Jaguar XF Ingenium diesel engine

It is unfortunate that one of the cabin’s most conspicuous limitations is the uncouth and muted grumble that fills it every time you start the XF’s Ingenium engine from cold.

Criticism of the refinement levels of modern four-cylinder diesel engines is widespread – BMW and Mercedes-Benz have both been dragged over the coals in this respect – but Jaguar Land Rover’s new motor is similarly not quite up to snuff in this respect.

The Jaguar XF we tried covered a quarter of a mile in 17.2 seconds, reaching a speed of 83.8mph
Matt Prior
Editor-at-large

With the noise – a distant yet classic grind of unwarmed ironwork – comes a tepid pitter-patter of vibration, too. It’s insufficient to grind an axe on, yet begrudgingly noticeable when you ideally want to feel nothing from the dirty work being done up front.

Mercifully, with a proper working temperature under it, the situation improves noticeably. The XF remains voluble when toiling through the low gears, but the soundtrack settles well beneath the wind noise when you’re up to speed.

It’s a shame that working the car into a lather from a standing start isn’t quite as precipitous as it ought to have been. Jaguar quotes 7.7sec for the higher-powered model’s sprint to 60mph.

The example on test – two-up and brimmed with fuel – lumbered over the tape in 9.4sec at Millbrook. That’s not unreasonably slow, perhaps, but being behind the latest Skoda Superb over the same ground is cause for some concern.

Thankfully, the XF ups its game in later gears, the combination of a respectable 317lb ft of peak torque plus a multitude of available ratios for the gearbox mean that the car’s sails rarely feel anything less than wind-filled.

It is by this barometer – as well as efficiency, of course – that we ultimately tend to appraise modern diesel engines and, in the first respect, the Ingenium meets its brief well enough.

Nevertheless, the XF doesn’t qualify as a class leader from under the bonnet, and given JLR’s huge investment in that particular area, that is a disappointment.

RIDE & HANDLING

The challenge of making a modern saloon agile, comfortable, fast, tenaciously grippy and confidence-inspiring all at once has – to varying degrees – been accomplished by each manufacturer that Jaguar would consider a rival.

Where they have been less successful is in making what is a sophisticated and computer-controlled product feel fun or feelsome in the nominally organic way that a mechanical device ought.

The XF takes camber change and quick corners in its stride
Nic Cackett
Road tester

It is this quality, among others, that the XF keenly addresses. A better-tuned chassis, with four doors, a large boot to the rear and a heavy oil-burner at the front, you will not find anywhere.

Separate the whole into any of its constituent parts – traction, turn-in, responsiveness, ride comfort – and from the driver’s seat, the compromise struck by Jaguar seems uncannily well judged.

The electric power steering, although inevitably lacking in granular feedback, is a progressively weighted and delectably quick affair. The previous XF’s rack was dainty and accurate. This one has a real oily, intuitive physicality to it. The rate of response is ramped up to suit the model’s sporting character, although not to the extent that it might overburden its fundamental ease of use.

The suspension, even on the R-Sport’s modestly stiffer set-up, strikes a similar balance. Jaguar has outdone itself with a passive configuration that deftly manages secondary intrusions, flows like emulsion through the primary and yet never gives up so much as a fat thumbnail’s depth in body control when progress is more strenuous.

As good as the new dampers clearly are, singling out specific components for praise almost risks diminishing the broad-canvas job done here. It is as much the cohesion between them that delivers the quintessential rear-drive tuning fork feel, rewarding a driver’s inputs with sensory output that resonates through the column and seatbacks.

It is surely a measure of the XF’s dynamic qualities that neither the Ingenium’s shortcomings nor the changing conditions of the car’s immediate surroundings ever particularly troubled our esteem.

The transition from town to country to motorway driving is remarkable for the conspicuous absence of any actual transition, Jaguar’s marvellous ensemble simply rolling England under its wheels with the same steady, implacable brilliance.

We’ve become well accustomed to Jaguar’s faculty for equipping its cars with a heady mix of verve and forgiveness beyond the limit, and the XF is no different. The car’s innate sense of balance, rear-driven impetus and amenability to being driven hard are practically all givens and as obvious at Millbrook as the colour of the trees.

The specific enhancements come in the XF’s composure — helped along by the R-Sport’s firmer settings, no doubt — that keep the model poised engagingly between surefooted and free-flowing.

Tellingly, and thrillingly, its eight-tenths clip is mighty fast and easily manageable, yet engrossing at the same time. The electrically assisted steering, fettled at great length for superior feel on initial input, makes managing the typically pointy front end a pleasure, with the rear axle inclined to break away only when specifically called upon to do so.

The XF’s lateral grip is sufficient to make such events difficult to coax purely with the throttle.

MPG & RUNNING COSTS

The XF is offered at four trim levels: Prestige, R-Sport, Portfolio and S. The last of these is the preserve of the V6 models and commands a £10k premium over the next most senior spec.

Given the focus on the business user, it is hardly surprising to find the model both competitively priced and decently equipped.

The choice between Portfolio and R-Sport has us split down the middle, but whatever your expectations either will hit the mark squarely
Matt Prior
Editor-at-large

The entry-level Prestige model gets leather seats, rear parking sensors and sat-nav and is around the same money as the equivalent BMW 5 Series.

The slightly more athletic R-Sport we drove adds mostly cosmetic enhancements to the firmer suspension, leaving the Portfolio, which has keyless entry, electrically adjustable seats, a reversing camera and an 11-speaker Meridian system for a £2200 walk-up.

Buying the 161bhp Ingenium engine and sticking with the manual gearbox and 17in alloys delivers a car with CO2 emissions of 104g/km, claimed to be the lowest non-hybrid score in the segment.

Most buyers will prefer the auto – still admirably efficient at 109g/km – although with the 178bhp motor tested, it ends up at 114g/km, which is highly competitive but not class-leading.

For the most frugal XF, Jaguar quotes 71.7mpg combined, a number trimmed to a claimed 65.7mpg in our test car’s case.

Real-world True MPG assessment dialled that back to 47.1mpg – a significant subtraction, clearly, but not dissimilar to the results for the Audi A6 and last generation 520d when they were tested.

CAP also expects the XF to outstrip its German rivals in the residual value stakes over three years and 36,000 miles.

VERDICT

Verdict

Model tested:

Rating: 9

Jaguar XF

Good

Poised yet pillowy ride

Handling

Increased size incorporated into its style

Bad

Cold engine noise

Interior a little too strait-laced

Not as quick as claimed

‘Good to drive’ was convenient enough shorthand for the previous XF’s most likable quality. However, its replacement spurns flyweight platitudes. Proper description of its same virtue is strictly the work of scrupulous longhand.

Exceeding our expectation of a business saloon was Jaguar’s stated goal. The XF doesn’t do that precisely, but it does go further toward fulfilling our wish list of dynamic attributes than any model currently on sale.

A more mature, better all-round prospect, with class-leading dynamics
Matt Saunders
Road test editor

Around the new XF’s class-leading steering, ride quality and feelsome balance, its maker has clustered a spacious, well-finished and very handsome car.

It continues to feel like an XF, too – one thoughtfully matured into a better all-round prospect.

It would be a near-flawless one if Jaguar had succeeded in polishing the Ingenium powerplant to the same standard.

For now, the engine is the only reason buyers have for thinking twice. In time, there may well be none.

Here at Autocar, we believe this version of the XF has the edge over the competition, particularly when it comes down to the actual driving element, leaving Audi A6 and Mercedes-Benz E-Class in its wake, however the G30 BMW 5 Series strikes the perfect balance between able to cope and excel with spirited driving and the effortless cruising.